Reverse Hypotheliefsoftware company adds Smartfi Proprietary Product
Cabe sat down with Housing‘S Reverse MortGage Daily (RMD) to discuss the dynamics of adding your own product to the set of visualization and conversion tools of the platform.
While the existing basis of customers the recording of the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) -driven Home Equity Conversion MortGage (HECM), CABE heard users that they also wanted their own option.
Integration of the product
“The challenge with that is that there are so many moving parts,” said Cabe. ‘[Principal limit factors] Change and programs often change, so it’s hard to tackle them. So we had conversations with a few different lenders and initially ended up working with Smartfi with their choice of fixed product. “
The product with fixed interest rates has a maximum loan limit of $ 4 million, on the same footing with other own offers in the room. In some states it has a minimum age qualification of 55 (which rises to 60 and 62 in others). And it has what the company calls a “abbreviated” approval process for condominiums. The product is available in 22 states and the District or Columbia.
The process for integration is relatively simple, Cabe said. If a lender or broker has already been registered with Smartfi and used the HECM tool, the own product is available for visualization and comparison with a traditional HECM loan, he explained.
“They can compare a HECM with a choice with a fixed product, or just a self -contained choice with a fixed product with standard reverse mortgages, refinancing and purchases,” he said. “The nice thing about the choice is that there is no really minimal loan amount, so it can go down to compete with the HECM.”
This offers new possibilities for conversion in a patented product, Cabe said, while he also used the visualization tools that are inherent in the existing software platform.
“We are incredibly enthusiastic to see the choice solved now that are available in the HECM tool platform,” said Kim Smith, senior vice president of wholesale in Smartfi.
“This partnership combines our leading production product with a game-changing tool for the Wholesale Channel-it-all demonstration of Smartfi’s dedication to product innovation and making reverse mortgages easy.”
Joshua Evink, vice -president of the wholesaler of the company, added that the recording of this type of visualization and comparison is what brokers have asked with the company.
It offers brokers the opportunity to illustrate more clearly how a reverse mortgage can work in their financial situation, with extra versatility that is granted by the inclusion of their own product.
Partnership process, look ahead
When demanding the process of bringing smartfi in the fold for the partnership, Cabe said that they were enthusiastic about the prospect of a clear and illustrative tool to compete in addition to more “traditional” reverse mortgage offerings.
“The possibility of making mainstream of reverse mortgages lies in having a normal product – a product that makes sense for a standard, traditional forward loan officer to present to a borrower 55, 60 or 62 and older,” he said.
“To do that very easily, and to bridge that gap from understanding to the other way around, that is what the HECM tool is really doing well.”
As far as the future is concerned, Cabe said that in conversations he will be conversations with other industrial players about a broader integration of their products in the HECM tool. But there have also been steps to clearly demonstrate the educational capacity of the product itself.
“One of the things we did in the first quarter is that we had an important training for our users,” he said. “We have done a 12-week accelerator program that was aimed at how we get things from previous customers who use the HECM tool and its illustrations, and how they can convert that company with the help of scripting and various things. Not only with library perspectives, but referral partners and then also aimed at financial advisers.”
CABE is hopeful that, because industry technology embraces better, the use of platforms such as the HECM tool can make a difference to push reverse mortgages in more regular conversations of financial services.
“When credit providers – including large forward stores that offer reverse – can change and change their sales process, and those forward loan officers can easily embrace and bridge that gap that gap from the front to the other way around, that is where I think the company can really take off and change pensioners,” he said.
